World Rankings: Wallabies, Boks fall

Mon, 19 Jun 2017 11:57

NEWS: South Africa have dropped to sixth in the latest world rankings, despite their victory over France in Durban last weekend.

Scotland, who upset Australia 24-19 in Sydney, did enough to move above South Africa into fifth place, because the Springboks only gained 0.76 of a point for beating France 37-15 - a scoreline remarkably matched a day later by their Under-20s side against Les Bleuets at the World Rugby U20 Championship - to take their tally on to 83.63 points.

Wales only enjoyed a marginal gain for a scrappy 24-6 win over Tonga in Auckland on Friday night to stay seventh, while France and Argentina are unchanged in eighth and ninth, respectively, following consecutive losses to the Springboks and England.

Ireland have replaced Australia in third place in the World Rugby Rankings after their 50-22 win over Japan in Shizuoka and the Wallabies' loss at home to Scotland.

Joe Schmidt's side added seven tries to the nine they managed against the USA the week before in Philadelphia as they registered another convincing victory in the second match of their three-game tour of North America and Japan.

With 11 regulars missing on British & Irish Lions duty, an exciting crop of young players turned on the style to produce a result that was worth 0.43 of a rating point.

After completing a 2-0 series whitewash of Argentina with a 35-25 victory over Los Pumas in Sante Fe, England have cut the gap on top-ranked New Zealand by 0.61 of a point over the past fortnight.

The All Blacks did not pick up any rating points for their crushing 78-0 win over Samoa so they now have a 4.64-point cushion over Eddie Jones' side.